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Robinhood sees 'A lot of Potential' in NFTs
Summary: Aparna Chennapragada, the chief product officer at Robinhood sat down with the Verge’s editor-in-chief, Nilay Patel, to discuss all things Robinhood, including their plan to get into the non-fungible token (NFT) market in a podcast released Tuesday morning. Robinhood is a popular stock and crypto trading app, which gained mass attention at the beginning of ...
Aparna Chennapragada, the chief product officer at Robinhood sat down with the Verge’s editor-in-chief, Nilay Patel, to discuss all things Robinhood, including their plan to get into the non-fungible token (NFT) market in a podcast released Tuesday morning.
Robinhood is a popular stock and crypto trading app, which gained mass attention at the beginning of last year for freezing trades on GameStop, after a group of Reddit posters tried to drive up the price of the stock. Despite that mixup that Robinhood was heavily scrutinized for, the California-based company has been at the forefront of providing users with easy access into trading stocks and crypto.
On Tuesday, the CPO broke news of Robinhood launching a new debit card, called the Robinhood cash card, allowing users to opt into a service that invests rounded up money into assets and stocks previously picked by the user. Of course, this card will do all the other normal things your standard debit card does.
The Robinhood cash card is replacing their “cash management” program which allows investors to spend uninvested money in their Robinhood account through a special Mastercard debit card.
In addition to talking about the cash card, Patel asked Chennapragada if she sees NFTs in Robinhood’s future.
“We absolutely think about NFTs. I have been fascinated by them and I think that the crypto team is excited,” she said. “I think there is a lot of potential in the use of NFTs.”
She also acknowledged that she likes the idea of NFTs being an “end” in itself, in some cases, and not a means to an end like cryptocurrency is. In other words, cryptocurrency is a means to buy other goods, while NFTs are the goods.
The former Google technical advisor is asking the tough questions: “How can we best participate? What are the customer problems that we can solve?”
Robinhood started off as a primarily stock trading platform, but has now ventured into the crypto space, even noting that they want to be known as a crypto first platform. In fact, Chennapragada mentioned that their crypto platform has a much more diverse set of users, hinting that the access of entry into crypto is more accessible.
Accessibility is one of the key reasons that brought Chennapragada from Google to Robinhood. The unique thing about Robinhood is their lack of trading fees, where other brokerages charge their clients between one and two percent on total purchase price.
In terms of crypto, Robinhood has faced some opposition because prior to January 2021, they did not have a crypto wallet. Users were only allowed to buy crypto and keep it in their Robinhood account. They could not transfer the crypto out and into a wallet.
However, that changed in 2021 when Robinhood rolled out their beta wallet for users to test. While the testing is still underway, it is accessible by 250,000 people now, with rumors of the official launch around the corner.
Author: Tyler Irvin
